“INSTEX cannot revive Europe’s destroyed reputation, let alone being a privilege for Iran,” he tweeted on Tuesday.
The remarks came as the Joint Commission of the JCPOA announced on Friday that long-awaited INSTEX had finally been made operational and available to all EU Member States and that the first transactions are being processed.
In late January 2018, Europe announced the establishment of a special trade mechanism dubbed as INSTEX (Instrument in Support of Trade Exchanges) in a bid to save JCPOA after the withdrawal of the United States. The mechanism, which is yet to prove its effectiveness, is said to initially cover trades of food, medicine and medical devices and to gradually include other areas.
Tehran says that INSTEX is not sufficient and doesn’t meet its demands. “INSTEX is actually banking transactions for trading food, medicine and medical equipment; this an insult the Iranian nation … the way Europeans act on INSTEX is not acceptable … Europe should honor its JPCOA commitments in trading and banking sectors with Iran. The export of Iranian oil and products are an important part of the JCPOA,” Mohammadreza Pour-Ebrahimi, a member of the Parliament’s Economic Committee, told Mehr News Agency on Sunday.
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